FSC Credibility Crisis in the Congo.Final - Greenpeace

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• About half of the area of SODEFOR’s Smartwood-certified logging permits in the Oshwe region are located inside the Salonga-Lukénie-Sankuru landscape. The Congo Basin Forest Partnership identifies this as a priority area for biodiversity conservation 18 . • Unfortunately, the Salonga National Park – a World Heritage site – is not a safe haven for biodiversity. Massive poaching is taking place in the area and is not at all under control 19 . The Park has been put on the list of world heritage sites in danger 20 . Unfortunately, SODEFOR is not an isolated example in the DRC. SIFORCO Another example is the Société Industrielle et Forestière du Congo (SIFORCO) – a subsidiary of the Swiss-based Danzer - which was granted FSC certificates for Chain of Custody and Controlled Wood (SGS-CW_/FM-008062 and SGS-COC-008149) on 22 September 2010 and 22 October 2010, issued by SGS as the certification body. Like SODEFOR, SIFORCO is involved in the fragmentation of large blocks of forests with a High Conservation Value. SIFORCO’s logging activities have also caused numerous social conflicts in the Bumba region which often resulted in violent police interventions and arbitrary arrests 21 . Greenpeace is currently investigating the most recent case of severe police violence against a local community that protested against SIFORCO. They claimed that SIFORCO did not honour its promises to invest in social infrastructure for the community. The conflict arose at the end of April 2011, in the Bumba area in Equateur province. Reports indicate that villagers protested in the SIFORCO logging area to prevent SIFORCO from operating until they honoured past promises. SIFORCO called for a police intervention, with the police apparently intervening in a very violent way: it was reported to Greenpeace that several villagers were badly beaten by police and this has resulted into the death of one person, Mr Momoma Tika Frédéric. It was also reported that several women were raped and many villagers’ goods were destroyed. The full details of this conflict are currently being investigated. SIFORCO has expressed to Greenpeace that it regrets the use of violence by the police. 18 CBFP 2006 – Les forêts du Bassin du Congo – Etat des forêts - page 185. 19 For example: http://www.dia-afrique.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=73:rdc--parcs-de-la-salonga-et-de-virunga-endanger&catid=37:politique-et-societe&Itemid=29 20 Debroux et al. (2007). Page 15: Most if not all of the DRC’s protected areas are endangered. A large number have become ‘paper parks’. In some areas, poaching has increased since the war ended. Salonga, one of the largest parks in Central Africa, reportedly has no more than 1000–2000 elephants left (Blake 2004). 21 Greenpeace International. (July 2010). Forest Reform in the DRC, Leaving People Out, page 8 http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/publications/reports/Forest-reform-in-the-Democratic-Republic-of-the-Congo-Leaving-peopleout/
Company: Congolaise Industrielle des Bois (CIB) 22 FSC Certificate: SGS-FM/COC-008483 Area: Loundoungou-Toukoulaka concession covering an area of 571,000 hectares. Issued: 10 February 2011 by the certifying body SGS. A summary of issues with this certificate • According to SGS, of the 571,100 hectares covered by this certificate, 537,420 hectares are HCVFs 23 . Among those identified, SGS lists: − high biodiversity of plants and wildlife; − rare, threatened and protected wildlife; and − forest-dependent indigenous peoples’ groups. 24 • As the certified area contains large unfragmented forest areas, CIB and SGS should have categorised these areas as HCVF2 25 and ensured that their values are maintained. 26 • At the same time SGS states that 444,100 hectares of the concession area are production forest, from which timber may be harvested. 27 However, harvesting of timber requires road infrastructure and therefore fragmentation of the area is inevitable. This means that the precautionary approach, as required by Principle 9, is not being applied and the HCV2 is under threat. • In 2004, Greenpeace recommended a series of steps that CIB’s operations needed to take before being eligible for FSC certification 28 . Crucially, it highlighted the importance of cancelling CIB's plan to build a sawmill in its Loundoungou concession because the mill, in combination with other infrastructure such as roads, would threaten biodiversity (due to increased poaching risks) and the well being of forest-dependent communities. Nevertheless, the sawmill was subsequently built. • In 2008, a scientific study 29 of the region in which CIB operates warned that ‘if the current road development trajectory continues, forest wildernesses and the forest elephants they contain will collapse.’ • SGS’s public summary suggests that the dismissal of half of CIB’s workforce in 2009 was well received locally. 30 It fails to mention that several demonstrators, many of whom were laid off in 2006, were arrested on 13 September 2010, as reported by the Congolese press 31 , raising questions around compliance with FSC standards on workers’ rights. 22 CIB is a subsidiary of Swiss-based tt Timber International AG. In December 2010 the Singapore-based Olam Group bought tt Timber from the Danish DLH Group. 23 http://info.fsc.org/servlet/servlet. FileDownload?retURL=%2Fapex%2FPublicCertificateDetails%3Fid%3Da0240 000006uqxYAAQ&file=00P40000006ICr4EAG, Public Summary Report, page 8. 24 http://info.fsc.org/servlet/servlet. FileDownload?retURL=%2Fapex%2FPublicCertificateDetails%3Fid%3Da0240000006uqxYAAQ&file =00P40000006ICr4EAG, Public Summary report, page 8 25 HCV2. « Forest areas containing globally, regionally or nationally significant large landscape level forests, contained within, or containing the management unit, where viable populations of most if not all naturally occurring species exist in natural patterns of distribution and abundance.” The High Conservation Value Forest Toolkit, Part 1: Introduction to HCVF, Proforest 2003 26 Principle #9: Maintenance of high conservation value forests: Management activities in high conservation value forests shall maintain or enhance, the attributes which define such forests. Decisions regarding high conservation value forests shall always be considered in the context of a precautionary approach, FSC-STD-01-001 (version 4-0) EN, Approved 1993, Amended 1996, 1999, 2002 27 http://info.fsc.org/servlet/servlet. FileDownload?retURL=%2Fapex%2FPublicCertificateDetails%3Fid%3Da0240000006uqxYAAQ&file =00P40000006ICr4EAG, Public Summary report, page 8 28 http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/publications/reports/CIB-Congo-Brazzaville/ 29 Blake S, Deem SL, Strindberg S, Maisels F, Momont L, et al. (2008) Roadless Wilderness Area Determines Forest Elephant Movements in the Congo Basin. PLoS ONE 3(10): e3546. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0003546 30 SGS Forest Management Certification Report, Section A, Public Summary, page 45 31 http://www.brazzaville-adiac.com/index.php?action=depeche&dep_id=42523&oldaction=liste&regpay_id=0&them_id =0&cat_id=0&ss_cat_id=0&LISTE_FROM=0&select_month=0&select_year=0
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FSC Credibility Crisis in the Congo.Final - Greenpeace

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